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Inside govt coffee plan after rationalising UCDA
Hoima City Woman Member of Parliament Nyakato Asinansi, Buhweju Constituency MP Francis Mwijukye, Kasambya County MP Mbwatekamwa Gaffa and Hoima East Division MP Patrick Isingoma Mwesigwa address the media at Parliament on Monday. PHOTO | DAVID LUBOWA
What you need to know:
- Among the changes, the UCDA extension services will be expanded to support farmers in coffee, cotton, and dairy sub-sectors.
A new division has been created in the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries (MAAIF) to superintend the coffee sub-sector once the rationalisation of the Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA) is complete.
Mr Frank Tumwebaze, the Agriculture minister, told the Agricultural Committee of Parliament on October 10 that the technical officers from UCDA will be absorbed into the new division, Coffee Production and Development.
“This revised structure for ministries that the Public Service presented to Cabinet and was approved will be operationalised after the rationalisation process is concluded with all the enabling laws enacted,” he said.
“Our position to the Ministry of Public Service, however, is that the newly created departments/divisions shouldn’t be limiting on staff numbers [establishment],” Mr Tumwebaze added.
The UCDA departments of extension services and agribusiness are being expanded and strengthened to oversee the Coordinating Office for Control of Trypanosomiasis in Uganda (COCTU), the Diary Development Authority (DDA), Cotton Development Organisation (CDO), and National Agricultural Advisory Services (Naads), which are also being phased out in the ongoing Rationalisation of Agencies and Public Expenditure (Rapex) programme.
For instance, more than 4,000 extension service workers will be pooled into one department and distributed across the country to offer services to different farmers engaged in coffee, cotton, and dairy farming, as opposed to the current status where each authority has been having its own officers.
“All the quality assurance inspectors and agronomists from UCDA and at the centre and regional offices must be given room for absorption in the new department/division. This is how MAAIF will be able to inherit the work of UCDA and do it more efficiently,” Minister Tumwebaze said.
UCDA has been conducting three major functions; promoting the growing and development of the coffee subsector, regulating all actors in the coffee value chain, and offering technical advice to the government on the right policies for the development of coffee and its associated value chain.
Parliament was on Thursday last week split as legislators voted on the National Coffee (Amendment) Bill, 2024, which seeks to rationalise UCDA.
Several opposition legislators, especially from Buganda and Bugisu sub-regions opposed the Bill, saying the Ministry of Agriculture has no capability and capacity to take on the roles and functions of UCDA.
However, the majority (159) of the MPs voted in favour of consideration of the Bill.
In an interview yesterday, the MAAIF Permanent Secretary, Maj Gen David Kasura Kyomukama, said they are more than ready to take on the responsibilities of UCDA.
“It is not the people of Buganda or Ankole or Tooro or Kigezi who said our coffee is not going, so let us form UCDA. It is rather the government in 1991, which formed UCDA and through a law, they amended in 1994 and another one, the Coffee Act of 2021,” he said.
“So now if the government says this thing is no longer working, why would you make a lot of noise?” Maj Gen Kyomukama wondered.
The rationalisation of UCDA, he said, is to reduce administrative costs and improve the profits that can be obtained in the coffee value chain.
“I have heard from some leaders saying that Ugandan coffee will not be taken [exported] because there's no body to certify it. That is a silly argument. UCDA does not give licences to people to export. It is the government of Uganda which gives licences to people to export. UCDA is not a private entity, it works on behalf of the government,” he said.
MAAIF’S coffee-handling plan
Information on the UCDA website indicates that the agency has been, among others, issuing certificates in respect of the grade and quantity of coffee, collecting, maintaining and disseminating statistical data in respect of all aspects of the coffee industry, monitoring world market price changes and adjusting the indicative price on a day-to-day basis to reflect the changes, liaising, with other international organisations and promoting Uganda coffee on the world market, and others.
These functions, Gen Kyomukama said, will easily be taken over by the ministry.
Gen Kyomukama said: “We are forming a Food and Agricultural Chemicals Authority, which will ensure that we regulate all food and beverages from the initial stage. You don't regulate food at the end, but you regulate it right from the beginning, we call it from farm to fork.”
He added: “We even regulate agricultural inputs, and so we are going to regulate that coffee value chain because it's very important for us,” he said.
Maj Gen Kyomukama said it is an insult to them when people say the ministry cannot oversee the coffee sub-sector yet the people in UCDA got the expertise they have from the former.
“The managing director, chairman, various directors, and most scientists at UCDA used to work in the ministry. So it is not true that the ministry does not have capacity, because if we are, when did they acquire capacity?” he wondered.
ABOUT COFFEE BILL
The National Coffee (Amendment) Bill, 2024, is already at the committee stage where each clause and any amendments will be de bated. After the committee stage, it will go to the third reading, which will offer legislators the last opportunity for legislators to debate its contents before it is passed .
